Chloroform on Quebec Street

“Dr.” Snepper objected strenuously, but Judge Grant solved the situation with the remark, “Of course, he pared corns.”¹

Snepper was accused of being a podiatrist, a foot specialist not a medical doctor in an often farcical, yet fundamentally serious inquiry into medical malpractice that took place over four spring days in Vancouver in 1913.² The Medical Association of British Columbia had made application for the inquiry, exercising its powers under the Medical Act. At issue was the conduct of four Vancouver medical doctors associated with the British Columbia Hospital Association. The Honourable David Grant, then junior judge in the Vancouver County Court, was assigned the case.³

Despite its name, the British Columbia Hospital Association (BCHA) was not a government-sanctioned body, but rather a private business operated out of a set of offices at 25 East Hastings Street, and a six-bedroom residential home at 3783 Quebec Street. The BCHA had formed in 1910, and sold memberships to a private medical insurance scheme run by one Henry Moses Snepper. At its peak, 13,500 people from across British Columbia apparently subscribed to the Vancouver-based BCHA, many living far beyond easy travel distance. The monthly per-patient subscription fee was one dollar, or ten dollars per year ($268 a year in today’s dollars). An entire family was covered for one dollar and fifty cents monthly, with an extra fifty cents for each child over twelve. Each member in good standing, maintained by paying monthly dues, was entitled to obtain medical care without charge. The medical care was